New Delhi: Congress today (July 7, 2004) sought an apology from former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee for his "highly misleading and unwarranted" allegation that Jan Sangh founder Shyama Prasad Mukherjee was killed as part of "conspiracy" between Nehru Government and Jammu and Kashmir Government.

Asking Vajpayee to withdraw his charge and apologise, party spokesman Anand Sharma told in New Delhi that the statement by the former Prime Minister and Chairman of the NDA (National Democratic Alliance) was "highly misleading".

"Why Vajpayee did not raise this matter when he was Prime Minister for about six years and what prevented him from doing so," he asked.

During his Prime Ministership, he said, half the time Vajpayee was trying to prove that he was "swyamsewak" and the other half equating himself with Nehru. Congress leaders were on record opposing such comparison between Vajpayee and Nehru, he added.